I recently acquired an RCA VFT650, a top-loading VHS machine from 1981 based on the Panasonic PV-1770. I replaced the belts, cleaned the idler tires, and cleaned the mode switch, and I currently have it working as far as being able to rewind, fast-forward, and load a tape.

There's a couple of weird issues that have me stopped up right now. First is that the pinch roller doesn't engage when the tape is loaded. When I try to move the arm by hand, it is very stiff. The second issue is that when the tape is loaded, it plays for a split second and then immediately aborts and unloads the tape. I don't know if this is related to the pinch roller issue or not.

I'm guessing the pinch roller arm should be able to move freely, and that there must be dried grease or something gumming it up? Should I try using WD-40 or something to break up the grease? Or might something else be wrong? Thanks for any ideas!

If the arm is held to it's piviot with a C clip remove clip and arm clean piviot surfaces with lighter fluid or rubbing alcohol add some white lithium grease (ask for it at a hardware store) and reassemble. If the grease is becoming glue in one place it is probably bad everywhere it was used and you'll have to clean and decrease all greased surfaces.

The play eject cycle sounds like other problems are at play, but take it a problem at a time.

Thank you for the info! I managed, with a considerable amount of force, to get the pinch roller assembly off. Cleaned it, greased it and the post it pivots on, and it's still stiff, although not as bad. The mechanism is now able to engage it, but it's still too stiff to retract upon unloading. It would seem to me that the metal has perhaps expanded/contracted over the years? I found another thread on here from someone who had the same problem on the same VCR.

I also discovered that the pivoting post immediately after the capstan and pinch roller, right before the take-up reel, is also very stiff and unable to move on its own. It's held on with a nut and has a spring underneath, so I'm afraid to remove it in case it's an alignment-critical part, until I hear otherwise.

At this point, I believe this VCR should be able to engage play mode, but mine still isn't - it loads all the way, then unloads. Looking at a video shot by the other person who made a post about a VFT650 on here, it looks like the solenoid is supposed to kick the pinch roller into place after loading, but mine doesn't. So I'm wondering if my mode switch is still dirty. I did spray it with contact cleaner from the outside, but maybe I'll have to take it apart to give it a deeper clean.

Update: I opened up and cleaned the mode switch - the fingers were coated in dirty grease, but no change in behavior. I also noticed that the head drum seemed to be rotating slower than 1800 RPM, so I turned up the free-running speed - that didn't change anything either.